TOY SAFETY

Hello everybody, this is Congressman John D. Dingell, and welcome to my podcast.

I have said on multiple occasions that a country’s highest responsibility is to protect its children. I am pained to say that it appears that in this duty, the United States government has been derelict, allowing dangerous toys – some containing lead paint or even worse – to slip past our borders, then onto store shelves and eventually into the hands of children.  Even the most loving and concerned parents have little chance to catch these toys, which is why they should be able to count on federal government to have a framework in place to prevent these toys from ever reaching our kids. It is my intention to determine the sources of this lapse and to take all necessary steps to correct it.

It would be far too easy to attribute this summer’s recalls of children’s toys and other products to China’s poorly regulated export manufacturers. To be sure, China is not without blame. But regulatory deficiencies, shoddy business practices, and the forces of globalization all play a substantial role in this catastrophe. In short, there is enough blame to go around.

As the Nation’s consumer safety watchdog, the Consumer Product Safety Commission, bears significant responsibility for protecting America’s children. Yet it has remained largely underfunded since its inception and of late, has endured an exodus of competent staff. In addition, the CPSC’s testing laboratory is an embarrassment.

For the sake of our children’s safety, I intend to determine exactly how the CPSC’s dwindling resources affected its ability to intercept dangerous products at U.S. ports, as well as whether or not a reliance on voluntary industry compliance has given rise to the recent toy and other children’s products recall crises.

This year, my colleagues on Committee on Energy and Commerce and I worked to produce a thoughtful, well-intentioned, and effective bill that will make crucial improvements in the CPSC to strengthen its ability to protect our Nation’s consumers. That is why I am proud to have co-sponsored H.R. 4040, the “Consumer Product Safety Modernization Act.” This bill, passed by the House of Representatives just before Christmas 2007, will ban any children’s product containing lead paint, require mandatory third-party testing for certain children’s products, require tracking labels for children’s products, and promote a greater public awareness of recalls. I believe that H.R. 4040 will go far to alleviate many of the problems we face, as well as strengthen the CPSC to meet the responsibilities under its jurisdiction. This bipartisan bill will improve our Nation’s capacity to protect its consumers and their children.

This is a good bill that will make our toys, high chairs and cribs safer, give new tools to overwhelmed and undermanned inspectors and send a message to companies from the board room to assembly line– clean up your act, because we are watching you. They need to know there is nothing more important than protecting our nation’s children – nothing.

This is John D. Dingell. Thank you for listening.